Cairo attacks continue; reporter dies from earlier shooting

New York, February 4, 2011--Journalists in Cairo faced assaults, detentions, and threats again today as supporters of President Hosni Mubarak continued their efforts to obstruct news coverage of protests demanding the Egyptian leader's ouster. While the extent of attacks lessened after a peak on Thursday, ongoing anti-press activities remain at an alarming level that must be halted, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. In addition, a journalist shot a week ago while filming a demonstration died today, a state newspaper reported, and Al-Jazeera reported that security
agents detained the network's Cairo bureau chief along with another journalist.

"It is stupefying that the government continues to send
out thugs and plainclothes police to attack journalists and to ransack media
bureaus," said Mohamed Abdel Dayem, CPJ's Middle East and North Africa
program coordinator. "This is doubly outrageous after the embattled
president, vice president, and prime minister all expressed various degrees of
regret for the unprecedented attacks on the media on Wednesday and Thursday.
They vowed to the Egyptian people in public statements and to the press in
interviews that such assaults would not be allowed to take place again."

Ahmad Mohamed Mahmoud, a journalist working for the
newspaper Al-Ta'awun, published by the state-owned Al-Ahram Foundation,
died today from gunshot wounds sustained on January 29, Al-Jazeera and the
semi-official Al-Ahramreported
today. Mahmoud was shot by what the newspaper described as sniper fire while
filming confrontations between security forces and demonstrators in central
Cairo's Qasr al-Aini area, which is adjacent to Tahrir Square. The death is the
first reported media fatality during the uprising.

"As
the unprecedented campaign against media continues, the Egyptian government has
made its intentions abundantly clear: Silence as many journalists as possible
no matter the political cost," said Abdel Dayem. "We call on the Egyptian
government to immediately release Al-Jazeera's Adbel Fatah Fayed, Ahmed
Youssif, and all other detained journalists. We call on governments around the
world to forcefully condemn this latest abuse."

In the last 24 hours, CPJ documented another 10 anti-press
assaults, 10 detentions, two attacks on newsrooms, and the hacking of a
major news website. In all, CPJ has documented at least 101 direct attacks on
journalists and news facilities this week, and it's investigating numerous
other reports.

Here
is a round-up of new attacks on the press:

Egyptian security agents have detained
Al-Jazeera Cairo Bureau Chief Abdel Fatah Fayed and journalist Ahmad Youssif,
who was with him at the time, according to Al-Jazeera's website.

Peter Beaumont, foreign affairs
editor at the U.K. Observer, and Jack Shenker, a Guardian
reporter, were stopped today while trying to enter Tahrir Square, the Guardianreported.
The paper said they were intercepted by government forces, forced to kneel
facing a wall, and interrogated. Beaumont was quoted by the Guardian as
saying: "Although the square itself is calm, things around the periphery are
very different. We were taken at a checkpoint and led to the Ministry of the Interior
... We were held for two hours ... and we were both warned that if we came anywhere
near the square again, things wouldn't go so nicely for us."

Al-Hurra's Cairo bureau was targeted on Thursday, the U.S.
government-funded station told CPJ in an e-mail. Men stormed its offices and "threatened
to kill Al-Hurra's two on-air journalists--Akram Khuzam and Tarek El Shamy--if they
didn't leave the building," the station said in a statement. The bureau was
immediately closed.

Two correspondents for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Robert
Tait and Abdelilah Nuaimi, were detained
in Cairo, the U.S.-government funded station reported. "We call on the Egyptian
authorities to release our correspondents and their equipment immediately,"
RFE/RL News Director Jay Tolson said.

Andrew Henderson, a photographer working for UAE-based daily
The National, was attacked on
Thursday by a group of young men who broke his camera equipment, National reporter Hugh Naylor told CPJ
in an e-mail. "Were it not for a bit of help from the military, he would likely
have been mauled to death by an angry mob," he told CPJ. Naylor himself was
punched several times in the head "by some angry, plainclothes youth standing
near the foreign ministry yesterday," he said. "I will credit one apparent
Mubarak loyalist for essentially saving my life. While pretending to be angry
at me and taking my passport, he walked me away from the crowd and back safely
to my hotel."

Al-Jazeera's Arabic website was hacked today, the station
reported on the air. According to a statement from the station, "For two hours
this morning (from 6.30 am-8.30am Doha time), a banner advertisement was taken
over and replaced with the slogan of 'Together for the collapse of Egypt,'
which linked to a page criticizing Al-Jazeera." A spokesman for Al-Jazeera said
that engineers "moved quickly to solve the problem," TheGuardianreported.

Al-Jazeera's Cairo office was stormed today by Mubarak
supporters, the station reported on the air. Its office was vandalized and it
equipment was set afire.

Prominent Egyptian Blogger Wael Abbas tweeted today that he
was detained and later released by military forces. He said he has been "getting stopped by every single checkpoint."

Al-Jazeera English producer Abdullah Mussa tweeted today
that he had been attacked. He wrote: "Released from street checkpoint. Three
machetes to my neck and angry mob. Foreign journalists are being accused if
inflaming situation."

Eric
Feijten, a reporter for Dutch news broadcaster Nederlande
Omroep Stichting (NOS), was arrested and released at least twice in the
past two days. NOS released a statement after his first arrest saying that
Feijten had been beaten and threatened. "Finally after 17 hours without
drinking or eating, he was released in a small hotel near the airport," NOS
wrote. He left Egypt today and tweeted: "At the airport and there
was even a ticket. Kicked out, so i am not happy because i failed to do my
job."

NPR reporter Lourdes Garcia-Navarro was attacked on
Wednesday, the station reported.
Garcia-Navarro was preparing a piece about the impact of demonstrations on the
daily lives of Egyptians when she and her colleague, Ashraf Khalil, were
surrounded by dozens of men. "We were asked if we were Israeli spies, or
employees of the Arabic news network Al-Jazeera, who have been a particular
target of the authorities here. It began to get heated and they wouldn't let us
leave," Garcia-Navarro said. She added that Khalil was punched repeatedly in
the face.

Andrew Butters of Time magazine was attacked on
Thursday. "I was grabbed by a young guy with a club who hauled me over to
an improvised checkpoint," NPR quoted
him as saying. He said it was clear that the actions were being coordinated
by police and security agents.

A group of Chinese journalists were briefly detained on
Thursday after customs officials discovered bulletproof vests, satellite
phones, and walkie-talkies in their luggage, according to news
reports. They were released but part of their equipment was
confiscated.

EDITOR'S NOTE:This alert has been updated to reflect the detention of Al-Jazeera's bureau chief and another journalist. A new quote from Mohamed Abdel Dayem has been added. The date Ahmad Mohamed Mahmoud was shot has been changed to the January 29 in the third paragraph.